Codependency Support Group

Codependency is defined as someone who exhibits too much, and often inappropriate, caring for another person's struggles. A codependent person may try to change, or feel shame about their most private thoughts and feelings if they conflict with the other person's struggles. If you are on a journey towards self-love, this support group is for you. Join us and find others...

Ready or not

I am a new sponsor with limited experience. If a person comes to you and ask that you be their sponsor and within a short time you realize that the person isn't ready, is it your call to tell them that? The reason I say this is because I believe I was asked was it OK for a potential sponsee to break her bottom lines and engage in continued behavior that brought her to meetings in the first place and me be her sponsor. I told her to call me back in a week and think about what she wanted to do that she couldn't have one foot in the door and one foot out.

In AA it's suggested that the sponsor have a year 'clean' time and finished the steps. If a relapse occurs with a sponsee (sp?), I drop them with the hope that they'll see the need to be accountable and responsible. That was what helped sober me up.

Mc Fudd that is a question and a half. I guess you have to go back to the core premise. The only requirement for membership is a desire for healthy and loving relationships. That is confusing too because how do you know if you are on track or not?? It is loving relationships that codependents want but seem to go about the wrong way.
Any takers on this one because it beats me. How do you not relapse with codependency???

I have been sponsoring CoDA members for 15 years, and it is very different than AA. You have to really be familiar with the CoDA literature to understand the process. The standard CoDA meeting format (you can get it off the CoDA.org website) defines relapse in CoDA (codependency) as a failure to continue to go to meetings and to refuse to work the program. Relapse in CoDA isn't about making a &quot;mistake&quot; or &quot;making an unhealthy choice&quot; like losing your abstinence in AA or NA.

In CoDA, we suggest that a member should not spnsor another member unless the spnsor has worked all 12 steps (CoDA) with a sponsor. That keeps the blind away from leading the blind.

With sponsoring in CoDA, it is really critical not to give advice, use sponsorship as a tool to control another or tell someone else what behavior they should or not continue to do. That's control. What we do is work the steps, mirror back what the sponsee is thinking, ask pertinent questions, share our own experience, strength and hope and be available for them as a support and guide.

I have refused to sponsor women who a) didn't keep their word to call or show up when they agreed to; b) refused to work their steps (on a continued basis at their own pace); but c) never because they did not do what I thought they should do, etc. like stop talking to an ex; leave a partner, get a job, etc.

Codependents rely way too heavily on what others say and do and think or advise, so the way they grow is to be sure they establish a relationship with a higher power, and don't make their sponsor that higher power. The CoDA literature on sponsorship in the Newcomer's Booklet and a separate pamphlet covers all of this and is all available on line for purchase too.

Alanon works exactly the same way. There is great Al-Anon sponsorship material as well. There are those in AlAnon and CoDA who come from AA that say these programs are much harder to work, because there is no defined point of relapse that you can look at another person and say, oh, you relapsed. Its a personal inventory, which requires daily and sometimes hourly vigilence to continue to make choices that are healthy. The only requirment for membership is to have a loving and healthy relationship, and we don't make that judgement for anyone but ourselves. Its all about self-diagnosis and willingness to show up for working the steps and attending meetings and asking for help, which is what life is all about.

sorry, I just thought of one more thing. Hope I am not lecturing here, I apologize if it sounds that way, but CoDA as an organization is very new (less than 20 years) so consequently, there are many fewer people that are ready to sponsor and that are sponsoring in that program. CoralL, any member of CoDA who attends meeting and is willing to work the steps with another member who has worked the CodA or AlAnon steps with a sponsor is ready to be sponsored. The problem is usually difficulty finding a person who is ready to sponsor. Because CoDa is so new, new members get what they need in sponsoring often from a CoDA member who has either worked all 12 steps with a sponsor in CoDA or in Alanon, and sometimes a CoDA member who has worked the 12 CoDA steps in a small stepstudy, where the members work the steps together in a very small group, so the work can be thorough. I sponsor women in both Alanon and CoDA because the step process is exactly the same. Working the steps means a) answering the questions in the CoDA green book (12 and 12) or answering them in AlAnon's Paths to Recovery. Either book is a great place for working the steps that get to the codependency we suffer from. I hope that helps.

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